Life Before Living
by Gothicragdoll
Summary: After listening to 9 talk about how he feels about this war against the machines, he feels he must speak with 6.


Life before Living

I was trying to find a wire. Any wire for that matter. I had taken everything out of my box of junk, and haven't come past a wire to save my soul. I sighed in frustration and threw…I don't even know what it was back into the junk box.

I looked over at 9, who was staring at the ceiling. He had been oddly quiet all evening. He usually talked on and on about nothing in particular. At first it had been annoying, but I got use to it and…even enjoy it…a little.

"Hey," I called over to him. He looked at me. "What are you thinking about?" I asked out of lack of having any real material for an actual conversation.

He looked back at the ceiling. "Nothing much. Just kinda dying a little inside."

This alarmed me. "Dying a little inside?" I asked in concerned confusion.

"Yep." He stated quickly without emotion.

"What brought on this?" I asked fishing for answers.

"I don't know really." He sat up to face me. "I just been feeling a little sad lately."

"Did 1 say something?" I knew I couldn't do anything to 1 for saying something to 9, but the information would help so that way I could have an idea of what to say.

"No," he shook his head. "Just been having odd feelings about the machines."

This intrigued me. Usually he was very optimistic when it came to the machines. He was sure that we're going to fight them and come out on top. "What do you been by odd feelings?"

"I've been hanging out with 3 and 4 lately. They know a lot about history and have been showing me a lot of things and I've noticed patterns." He said. "It just seems to me that everything gets worse before it gets better. One action leads to the next. I guess what I'm saying is that it's going to take a tragedy to makes things better for us. This fight with the monsters isn't going to be…I want to say easy, but the word doesn't fit…it's not going to be all right. Bad things are going to happen. Really bad things and I'm sad about it." He looked away from me. "I'm not afraid either." He said. "I've accepted the fact that bad things are going to happen." He grabbed his zipper.

I sat there and thought about what he had said. I watched him holding on to his zipper. What did he mean by he wasn't afraid? That he's accepted…"Wait!" I said. "You think you're going to die?"

He looked up at me, still holding his zipper. "I've considered it." He said. "I'm still willing to fight though. This is important."

"How can it be that important?" I admit I was disturbed by his sudden acceptance of death. He was so young. At the same time I had to admire him. I had been living for quite some time and I am still afraid to die. I don't want to die.

He seemed flabbergasted by my question. "It is important because it is the only way we'll live. I'm willing to die to give us that chance."

"We're alive right now." I said my voice rising.

"No." he shook his head. "Time is just standing still for us. We haven't lived yet. We know nothing beyond the cathedral. At least I don't. Sure we've gone to the library, but what else have we seen? What else do we know? We know how to run and hide. We know that to survive we must stay away from the machines. Aren't you tired of this?" he got off the bed and walked over to me.

He sat on the ground looking up at me and set his hands on mine. "Don't you want to see the world when it looks like the paintings we see in the library?"

"Those are just paintings, 9." I said holding his hands. I had been alive when the humans were here, but I had never seen the world look like it did in their paintings.

"No," he shook his head. "I refuse to believe it. The beauty in those paintings must have come from somewhere. I don't think the humans just imagined the world like that. I think it did look like that once, and I want to see it like that." He squeezed my hand. "Even if I die and don't get to see it, thinking about it being that beautiful again is enough to keep me going. To keep me fighting and believing that what we're fighting for is worth it.

"Through this fight we're not just redeeming the wrongs of the humans, but of ourselves. We're no better then them. They created the machines that destroyed this place, but we don't even try to defend it." He smiled. "It's the right thing to do, 5."

I stared at him simply bewildered. I wish I could have half the courage he has. Willing to die for, to me, what seemed to be a lost cause. He sat beside me and hugged me. I held him in return, thinking about what he had said. I don't know how long I held him before I realized what was wrong. I didn't want to admit he was right. I'm scared and want to avoid admitting it as long as possible, but I couldn't lie to myself. I knew I didn't want to admit it and I guess that is all that really matters. That I know it. I squeezed him gently before pulling away.

"You know what, 9?" I asked him softly. He looked up at me with that cute, innocent smile he has.

"What?" he asked.

"You're right about bad things are going to happen." I said sadly. I knew it, and I'm sure everyone else did. 9 was just the first person to bring it up in conversation besides 6, and the others, including myself rarely listened to 6. I was suddenly ashamed because I knew I was guilty of just ignoring 6's fits. I think I was more willing to listen to 9 because he was calm about it, which scared me. 6 went into hysterics, but that wasn't a good excuse. I knew I was going to half to apologize to 6.

9 hugged me again. "I know it's sad, but we cannot avoid it. I would do anything to avoid it, but everything will be all right in the end. It may not come up a happy ending, but we'll be free, and I think that's most important." He got up. "I think for now we're content with our own peace of mind."

"What do you mean?"

"6 draws to deal with it, 3 and 4 study history and literature, 7 practices fighting, 2 and you create things, 8 and 1…they do whatever they do." He said.

"What about you?" I asked noticing he left himself out.

He shrugged. "I haven't found anything I'm really good at yet or anything I like to do in particular."

I nodded. "You will." I said smiling at him.

He laid back down on the bed and resumed to stare at the ceiling. I could almost feel his thoughts and they raced through his head. I went back to putting things away. "5?" I heard him call to me.

"Yes?"

"Thanks," he said. "For listening."

"Anytime." I smiled at him.

After talking to 9 about the machines I felt I needed to apologize to 6. I walked silently down the hall trying to figure out what I was going to say. I heard some humming coming from his room followed by some giggling and then some more humming.

I walked into his room to find him going through a pile of papers. He was taking old pictures down, putting new ones up, and throwing others on the floor. He'd stop every once in awhile to laugh at a picture before tossing it to the ground.

"Um…6?" I started, watching him. "Is now a good time?"

He froze before slowly turning to face me. His face expressionless before smiling brightly. "Yes it is! I thought you might be those voices, so I wasn't sure if someone was really talking to me or not." He said excitedly while trying to pick up some crumbled and scattered papers. "I apologize for the mess." He cleared a path to his bed and made a spot for me to sit.

"What are you doing?" I asked sitting down.

He brought his hands up to his face and shook them as he spoke. "I hate having to throw out pictures just because…" He curled his fingers slowly and lowered them to his side. "No matter when, what the circumstance, or how poorly drawn…it's still important to me. It's who I am. It's who I was and what lead up to that change of heart, mind, and, or soul." He shrugged. "But every once in awhile keeping al these pictures can be overwhelming and I need a change." He laughed at himself. "Also having all these pictures covering the wall completely makes me look a little crazy."

He sat on the floor to look up at me. "I'm sorry." He said. "You came in to talk to me and I'm ranting." His smile quickly started to fade when I didn't speak right away. "Is something wrong?" He asked, his whole body a perfect description of his concern.

"6, I've been thinking and I feel…" I really didn't know how to say it. "I think I've treated you unfairly and I'm sorry."

He cut me off. "Don't!" he shouted, putting his hands up to silence me. "Don't." he repeated softly putting his hands in his lap. He looked down at them. "5, please don't." he shook his head. "I knew this was going to happen." He got up and started pacing. "I knew it. Once he came everything was going to get better. The others were going to believe it as well." He stopped to face me.

"5, please don't." his face was trying to express multiple emotions. "There is nothing to be sorry for. Yes, it hurts, but once I met all of you, I knew that we're all different. We all see the world differently. I accepted this. I…I don't know how to put it into words, but I understand. I never minded. It's okay. I promise I never minded." Somewhere he began pacing again and walked over to me. "Don't." he whispered. He crawled onto my laugh. "Don't, please don't." he held me.

6 caught me by surprise. I slowly started to put my arms around his body. I wasn't too sure what I could say. It seemed like my apology upset him more then the way we all treated him.

It wasn't long before I realized he had fallen asleep in my arms. I didn't want to wake him so I just held him.


End file.
